The Dating App Guide for Guys Who Hate Dating Apps

I want to start by saying I genuinely hate dating apps. I've had the "maybe I should just delete all of them and meet someone at a bookstore" thought at least forty times. I've stared at a blank text cursor trying to think of something interesting to say to a woman whose only prompt response was "I love tacos and The Office." I've been unmatched mid-conversation for reasons I will never understand and have spent too long trying to.

And yet. I met my last girlfriend on Hinge. My buddy Jake met his wife on Bumble. My coworker Dave, who is objectively terrible at talking to women, has somehow gone on more dates through apps than any of us.

The apps work. They just work in a deeply annoying way that requires you to understand what you're actually dealing with. So here's everything I've learned from years of swiping, matching, messaging, and occasionally going on dates that didn't make me want to move to a cabin in Montana.

Your Photos Are Doing 90% of the Work (And Yours Are Probably Bad)

I say this with love: most guys' dating app photos are atrocious. Group shots where nobody can tell which one you are. Gym selfies with visible bathroom tile. That one from your cousin's wedding where you look great but you cropped out your ex and now there's a mysterious floating hand on your shoulder.

Here's what actually works, based on watching what gets results and what doesn't.

Lead with a clear, well-lit photo of your face. Not a selfie. Not a photo from forty feet away. A photo where someone can see what you look like, taken by another human being, in natural light. This is your billboard. If it's blurry, dark, or you're wearing sunglasses, people are swiping left before they even get to your bio.

Include one full-body shot. Not because anyone is judging your body type -- but because not including one makes people think you're hiding something. Humans are suspicious creatures. Just give them the information.

Show yourself doing something. Hiking, cooking, playing guitar, standing next to something interesting on a trip. This isn't about bragging. It's about giving someone a conversation hook. "Oh cool, where was that hike?" is infinitely easier to send than "Hey, how's your week going?"

One photo with friends. Just one. It signals that you are a normal person with a social life. More than one and nobody can figure out which person you are.

Delete the fish photo. I don't care how big it was.

If you don't have good photos, ask a friend to take some next time you're out doing something. This isn't a photoshoot. It's five minutes with someone's iPhone in decent lighting. You will feel ridiculous and the photos will be ten times better than anything you currently have.

Your Bio: Less Is More, But Zero Is Too Little

The perfect dating app bio is three to five sentences that make someone think "this person seems fun and normal." That's it. You're not writing a cover letter. You're not performing standup. You're giving someone just enough to work with.

What works: a specific detail about your life, something mildly funny, and one thing that invites a question.

Something like: "Software engineer who cooks more than he codes. Currently on a mission to find the best birria tacos in the city. I will absolutely destroy you at mini golf."

What doesn't work: listing adjectives about yourself ("adventurous, loyal, ambitious"), quoting The Office, writing "just ask" (nobody will), being self-deprecatingly negative ("I don't know why I'm on here"), or putting your height in your bio unprompted unless you're notably tall and want to lead with that.

Your prompt responses matter too, if the app has them. Treat them like your bio -- specific, lightly funny, not trying too hard. "The key to my heart is..." followed by "someone who isn't afraid to eat gas station food on a road trip" tells me more about you than "loyalty and good vibes" ever will.

Which App for What

Not all apps are the same, and using the wrong one for what you're looking for is like showing up to a pickup basketball game in cleats. Technically footwear, but you're going to have a bad time.

Hinge is genuinely the best all-around app for most guys right now. The prompt-based profiles give you more to work with when starting conversations, the algorithm is decent, and the user base generally skews toward people looking for something real. If you're going to be on one app, make it this one.

Bumble has the women-message-first mechanic, which is either a relief or frustrating depending on your perspective. The upside: if you match, she's already interested enough to reach out. The downside: a lot of matches expire because she didn't send a message in 24 hours, and there's nothing you can do about it. Bumble works well, but requires patience.

Tinder still has the largest user base, which means more options but also more noise. The signal-to-noise ratio is rougher here. It's fine for casual dating but the swipe-heavy format makes it harder to stand out. If you're using Tinder, your photos and opening line matter even more because people are making faster decisions.

Coffee Meets Bagel gives you a limited number of matches per day, which sounds restrictive but actually forces more intentional choices on both sides. Good if you're the type who gets overwhelmed by infinite swiping.

My advice: pick two apps max. Running four apps simultaneously is a part-time job that will drain your soul.

How to Actually Start a Conversation

"Hey" doesn't work. "Hey, how's your week going?" barely works. "You're beautiful" is nice but gives her absolutely nothing to respond to.

The best opening messages do one simple thing: reference something specific from her profile and add a question or a take. That's it. You're showing that you actually looked at her profile and you're making it easy for her to respond.

"I see you went to Iceland -- did you do the Golden Circle or go more off the beaten path?" is a thousand times better than "Love your travel photos!"

"Wait, you put pineapple on pizza AND you're a Knicks fan? How much suffering can one person enjoy?" is better than "We have a lot in common."

The goal of the first message isn't to be the funniest person alive. It's to start a conversation that feels natural. Think of it like talking to someone at a party -- you'd riff on something you both noticed, not walk up and recite a compliment.

And if you're struggling with what to say, here's a trick that sounds dumb but works: pretend you're texting a friend. That casual, low-stakes energy is exactly what good opening messages sound like.

The Conversation Phase (Don't Live Here)

Once you're talking, a lot of guys make one of two mistakes. They either send one-word responses and let the conversation die, or they turn the chat into a 72-hour texting marathon where they share their entire life story before they've ever met in person.

Both are bad. The first one is obviously lazy. The second one is trickier because it feels productive -- you're "getting to know each other." But here's what actually happens: you build up this elaborate mental picture of someone based on text messages, and then you meet them and they're a completely different vibe in person. All that texting energy gets wasted.

The sweet spot is somewhere between three days and a week of messaging before you suggest meeting up. Enough to establish that you're both normal, interested, and capable of holding a conversation. Not so much that you've already covered every possible first-date topic.

When you suggest meeting, be specific. "We should hang out sometime" is vague and puts the planning burden on her. "There's a great taco place on 5th Street -- want to grab dinner there Thursday or Friday?" is a plan. Plans are attractive. Vagueness is not.

The First Date Itself

Keep it simple. Coffee or drinks for a first date is perfectly fine. You don't need to plan an elaborate evening. The whole point is to see if you enjoy each other's company in person, and you can figure that out over one drink.

That said, if you want to stand out, do something slightly more interesting than "drinks at a bar." A walk through a cool neighborhood, a trip to a farmers market, a low-key cooking class. Anything that gives you something to do together besides stare at each other across a table. If you need ideas that won't nuke your bank account, I wrote a whole thing about date ideas that don't require a second mortgage.

One underrated move: suggest a place you actually know and like. Having a spot you're genuinely enthusiastic about -- "they do this smoked old fashioned that's insane" -- is way better than frantically Googling "good date bars near me" an hour before. It shows you have a life and opinions.

And while we're on the topic of having your act together, your apartment doesn't need to look like a West Elm catalog, but if the date goes well enough that she ends up seeing it, you want to clear the bar of "this person is a functioning adult." A few small upgrades that show you care about your space go a long way.

Mistakes That Are Killing Your Results

I've made most of these. Learn from my pain.

Being too available. Responding to every message within eleven seconds makes you seem like you're sitting by your phone waiting. You probably are. Don't let them know that.

Swiping right on everyone. The algorithms punish this. If you swipe right on every single person, the app pushes your profile to the bottom of the stack. Be selective. It actually helps you.

Not having your profile reviewed by a female friend. This is the single most valuable thing you can do. Women will catch things you'd never notice -- the photo where your expression looks weirdly intense, the bio line that reads as arrogant instead of confident, the prompt answer that accidentally sounds like a red flag. Buy your friend coffee and ask her to be brutally honest.

Treating rejection personally. Someone not responding, unmatching, or saying they're not interested isn't a referendum on your worth as a human being. It's a stranger on the internet who doesn't know you making a snap decision based on limited information. It means nothing about you. This is easy to say and hard to internalize, but you have to try.

Getting bitter. This is the big one. The apps can grind you down. The ghosting, the dead-end conversations, the matches that go nowhere. It's genuinely demoralizing sometimes. But the second you start bringing that resentment into your profile or your conversations, it's over. Nobody wants to go on a date with someone who's visibly frustrated with the process they're both participating in.

If you're feeling burned out, delete the apps for a month. Seriously. Go do stuff. Come back when you're in a better headspace. The apps will still be there, and you'll be better at using them when you don't hate everything about them.

The Honest Truth

Dating apps are a tool. They're not magic and they're not the enemy. They connect you with people you'd never cross paths with otherwise, but they can't make you interesting, confident, or good at conversation. That's on you.

The guys I know who do well on dating apps aren't the best-looking guys. They're the ones with clear photos, profiles that sound like actual humans, and the ability to ask a decent question and listen to the answer. That's the bar. It's not that high. But you'd be shocked how many people can't clear it.

Put in a little effort on your profile. Be genuine in your conversations. Suggest a real plan. Show up as yourself, not some performance-optimized version of yourself that you can't maintain past date three.

And if it's not working, take a break. Go outside. Develop a hobby. Get your life to a place where you're genuinely enjoying it on your own, and then come back to the apps as someone who has something to offer rather than someone who needs something to fill a gap.

That's the whole playbook. It's not complicated. It's just annoying. Welcome to modern dating.